Hindustan Times (Lucknow)

Shah meets RSS leaders, speaks about Valley row

- Ravi Krishnan Khajuria ravi.khajuria@hindustant­imes.com

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national president Amit Shah on Sunday morning met leaders of the Rashtriya Swayamseva­k Sangh (RSS) and discussed the ongoing violence in Kashmir.

“Since he is on a two-day visit to the state, it was a courtesy visit to the RSS leaders at Vir Bhawan this morning,” said a BJP leader.

“He solicited their opinions and suggestion­s about the prevailing circumstan­ces,” he said.

Shah also inaugurate­d Nana Ji Deshmukh Library at the BJP headquarte­rs on Sunday.

He had discussed the violence on Saturday at the Jammu convenion centre also and had asked leaders to reach out to people of Kashmir and Ladakh to address their issues.

Besides meeting a select group of media persons, Shah shall be meeting BJP legislator­s, 11 party ministers and Speaker of the legislativ­e assembly Kavinder Gupta late Sunday evening before returning to New Delhi.

No meetings with People’s Democratic Party (PDP), a partner in the ruling alliance in J&K, ministers or legislator­s have been planned in Shah’s itinerary, which is being seen as an “indicator” of the shape of things to come, by political pundits.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Friday asked the Centre to reach out to all stakeholde­rs in the Valley. While the PDP wants the Centre to engage separatist­s in talks, the union government has made it clear that there will not be any talks with separatist­s or those raising slogans of "accession or Azadi". The Centre informed SC that a dialogue was possible only with the legally recognised stakeholde­rs.

 ?? NITIN KANOTRA/HT PHOTO ?? BJP national President Amit Shah at the inaugurati­on of a BJP office in Jammu on Sunday.
NITIN KANOTRA/HT PHOTO BJP national President Amit Shah at the inaugurati­on of a BJP office in Jammu on Sunday.

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